After Prince George voted to close its crown jewel ice rink for the rest of the year, don’t expect Kamloops to make the same decision with the Sandman Centre.

Prince George expects to save just over $600,000 over five months by closing the CN Centre and two other rinks, a decision made to cut operating costs because of the pandemic.

Deputy mayor Dale Bass says Kamloops is in good shape for the rest of this year when it comes to its budget.

“We’re in pretty darn good shape. We did well in getting our property taxes received. Some of the business property taxes have not come in yet but they have until September. We haven’t had to dip into our reserves. And we’re a fiscally sound council at city hall. We’re okay right now.”

Kamloops council already cut out more than $7.2 million in spending for this fiscal year.

Right now, only MacArthur Island has ice in, and Kamloops city staff expect ice to be put in this fall in the Sandman Centre and likely all other rinks as well.

“Just a few weeks ago, because I was tired of Zoom meetings, I asked why we could not start holding our council meetings in the rink, on the floor. So that we could bring in the public and have total distancing. And the answer I got back was that they were still optimistic that they would be putting ice in the for the fall, or early winter,” Bass says.